Last Sunday I was proud to participate in Launch 48 Sydney as a social media mentor to four promising technology startups. The energy around community building and startups in Sydney right now is running at a frenetic pace – oh to be 20 years younger I sometimes wish, as the people I am meeting who are building new businesses are only 18-25 years old! How inspiring is that? One “young’un” I met recently is only 18, and started a mobile application business from home (still living with parents) and is now generating revenue! (I can’t remember the details but when I do I will share)

Tony Hollingsworth ‎mentoring‬ Launch 48 Sydney Adventurare team

I want to highlight some of the people around this event. They give back to the community. They get out and achieve. They inspire through leadership. They inspire through their actions. If you want some inspiration in your lives, chase down the following:

Vicky Lau – a volunteer organiser for #Launch48Syd and the reason I got involved. Vicky met with me (with some delicious chocolates – temptress!) and within minutes her passion, intellect, professionalism and dedication to the task at hand had me sold. I was in! Vicky is very busy yet still finds time to get out and organise a weekend hackathon. Wow!

Grant Downie – I only just met Grant on Sunday and it is through his efforts that last weekend’s Launch48 Sydney event occurred – Melbourne is this coming weekend (details here) so if you are interested in helping out get in touch with Grant. He is giving back to the community simply because he can, and he obviously cares.

Annie Beaulieu – leading the Adventurare team who are building a web application to help you plan your next “Rare Adventure” – this one sounds fascinating and I can’t wait to learn more.

Oliver Lee – building Hero Without a Mask, combining Happiness with Gamification – bring it on! Oliver and his team showed me an interactive mobile app prototype they had already built within 2 days, and I was impressed. Watch this space – a very interesting startup indeed.

VC’s have poured US$115million into location start-ups. Are mainstream people using these networks yet? Not really, but with Facebook launching Places, the market is about to heat up. The New York Times reports….

Social Innovation BarCamp is on in Sydney today. This “BarCampUnconference” will be an open conversation where anyone can share their thoughts, ideas and ambitions. They style is that of open, participatory workshop-events, whose content is provided by participants. I first attended a “BarCamp” in November 2008 and it was fantastic. You can read my blog post here. If you can get down to COFA in Sydney’s Paddington today I recommend it – it starts at 930am.

Our society has seen incredible growth and progress in industry, technology and communication. Social Innovation is the process of inventing, securing support for, and implementing novel solutions to needs and problems, such as:

overcrowding and congestion in our cities

fragility of our resources and natural environment

disconnection, stress and loneliness

obesity in the western world whilst extreme poverty and starvation in the third world

mental health issues

an education system that sometimes does not nurture our most creative and brilliant minds

dissemination of our indigenous cultures

I want to thank Kate Carruthers and Michelle Williams in advance of today for the obvious effort they have put in to organsing this event. Kate and Michelle are part of a community in Sydney who I believe are making a difference: smart, generous people who share their knowledge and experience with others. You should connect with Kate and Michelle and learn more about them. Two of the most inspiring people I know in Sydney.

Have a look at these recent BarCamp Canberra photos by Ruth Ellison to get a sense of the atmosphere at these important events:

Hey there, Tony Hollingsworth here realising our collaborative blog hasnt' been updated for a while so popping in to say hi and remind everyone about this great event every Thursday in Mosman. Originally starting at 930am every Thursday, many still arrive then but others are available earlier and have started arriving from 8am. Usually between 8am-11am you will find friendly faces and plenty of great ideas being discussed.

Here's a great video which captures the magic and atmosphere of coffee mornings. This one was filmed at the Surry Hills coffee morning by Scott Drummond which takes place every Friday morning in Sydney.

Please drop us a comment here, or even post to this blog – it's open to everyone. Simply email your post to " post @ nscm.posterous.com and it will land here in the blog!

Friendly reminder that an informal coffee morning takes place every Thursday in Mosman at Cafe Prego, Shp2/ 573 Military Rd Mosman.

Northside Coffee Mornings is a living example of "the true spirit of sharing and collaboration" that can occur when between people. These words come from Nancy Georges who has seen her own business benefit from the serendipitous connections that are more likely to occur after a visit to coffee mornings.

If you've just landed on this post from Twitter, you've found the collaborative blog. You're welcome to post content to it – simply email the content to post@nscm.posterous.com and Posterous will take care of the rest.

I travel from the city yet with my office is in St Leonards this coffee mornings really suits me. I would urge any northside workers who travel from the city to consider the great bus service from Wynyard. I must thank Paul Wallbank for suggesting this. Rather than continuing on the train to North Sydney, get off at Wynyard, walk to Stand A on Carrington Street and grab the bus: 244, 245 or 247 to choose from. Here's a link to the bus timetable (links to PDF file). Its less than 20 minutes from Wynyard.